//Field

Ballot chase: winning in vote-by-mail states

Facts checked against official sources · September 9, 2026

In a vote-by-mail state there is no election day, only an election window. Ballots land in mailboxes two to four weeks before the deadline, a large share come back in the first week, and by the final weekend most of the people you are still calling have already voted. A campaign that runs a traditional election-day get-out-the-vote plan in Oregon or Colorado spends its last, best week talking to people whose ballots are already counted.

Ballot chase is the fix: every day, take the county's list of voters whose ballots have come back, subtract them from your target universe, and spend the day only on the people who have not returned. This guide covers how the calendar changes, what a returned-ballot file is and who publishes it in each vote-by-mail state, the daily loop, cure and signature chase, permanent early-voter lists, and why the last week is about non-returners rather than persuasion.

How universal vote-by-mail changes the calendar

Eight states and the District of Columbia mail a ballot to every registered voter: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont, and Washington, according to NCSL's table of all-mail states (updated 2026-08-07). Arizona is not on that list, but most Arizona voters are on the Active Early Voting List and receive a ballot automatically, so it behaves like one for planning purposes.

The date that matters is the day ballots drop. Oregon county clerks mail ballots between the 20th and 14th day before the election under ORS 254.470. Washington auditors mail at least 18 days before under RCW 29A.40.070. Colorado's 2026 election calendar has clerks mailing general-election packets no sooner than 29 and no later than 25 days before November 3, 2026, so between October 2 and October 9. Utah mails no sooner than 21 and no later than 7 days before under Utah Code 20A-3a-202. Nevada clerks send a mail ballot to every active registered voter not later than 14 days before under NRS 293.269911. California counties begin mailing 29 days before under Elections Code 3001. Arizona early ballots go out starting 27 days before under A.R.S. 16-542.

Everything in your plan moves up to that date. Persuasion mail must land before ballots do. The voter-ID canvass must be done before ballots drop, because after that the question at the door changes from who are you supporting to have you returned your ballot. Your final push is not the weekend before election day; it is the four or five days after ballots arrive, when most people who are going to vote sit down with the packet.

When ballots go out and when signature problems can be fixed
State	Ballots mailed	Signature cure deadline
Oregon	20th to 14th day before (ORS 254.470)	21st day after election (ORS 254.431)
Washington	At least 18 days before (RCW 29A.40.070)	Before certification, about 21 days after (RCW 29A.60.165)
Colorado	29 to 25 days before (2026 SOS calendar)	11:59 p.m., 8 days after election
Utah	21 to 7 days before (Utah Code 20A-3a-202)	Noon on the last business day before the canvass
Nevada	Not later than 14 days before (NRS 293.269911)	5 p.m. on the sixth day after election
California	Begins 29 days before (Elec. Code 3001)	22 days after a statewide election, or 2 days before certification (Elec. Code 3019)
Arizona (early ballots)	Starts 27 days before (A.R.S. 16-542)	5th business day after federal elections; missing signature by 7 p.m. election day (A.R.S. 16-550)

What a returned-ballot file is

When a county receives a mail ballot, it scans the envelope and records that the voter's ballot is in, before the ballot is opened or counted. That record, one row per voter who has returned, is the returned-ballot file. Depending on the state it is called a ballot status report, matchback data, a voted file, or a returned ballot list. It carries the voter ID, name, sometimes the date received, and often a status: received, accepted, or challenged for a signature problem.

It never tells you how anyone voted. It tells you that the voter is done, which is the single most useful fact a field program can have in the final two weeks. It also tells you who has a problem with their envelope, which is the seed of the cure chase.

Most counties publish cumulative files: the file on day six contains everyone from days one through six, not just the new returns. Build your process so that re-ingesting the same voter is harmless and the count of new voters each day is what you watch.

Match returned-ballot rows to your list on the voter ID only. A name-based match that fires wrongly silently removes a real target from your chase list, and nobody will ever notice it happened.

Who publishes it, state by state

The source is official in every state; the question is whether it comes from the state or the county, how often it updates, and what it costs. Confirm the current product with the office before you build a plan around it, because report names and formats change between cycles. Two examples of the paperwork: Lewis County's VoteWA data page explains Washington's free matchback download, and Colorado's Elections Division data request form is where you order the returned-ballot list.

Oregon: the Secretary of State posts daily ballot return reports and a ballot-return history on its election statistics page. Per-voter return status comes from the Elections Division, which also sells the $500 statewide list, or from your county clerk during the window.
Washington: the Secretary of State posts ballot return statistics after 5 p.m. each business day from two weeks before election day until certification (October 20 for November 2026). Per-voter matchback data, listing ballots received, accepted, or challenged, is a free download.
Colorado: the Secretary of State sends a daily weekday update of ballots returned; its June 25, 2026 release reported 578,570 returned as of June 24. The per-voter product is the Public List of Voters with a Returned Ballot (CE-068c), ordered from the Elections Division, updated daily.
Utah: voters can track their own ballot through vote.utah.gov, and the statute requires every mailed ballot to include instructions for signing up for status notifications. There is no single statewide per-voter file this guide could verify; ask your county clerk what returned-ballot report it provides to candidates and how often.
Nevada: county election departments are the source. Clark County publishes early voting turnout data as a daily listing of who voted and where, a mail ballot data file, and signature curing data for the current election. Washoe County provides equivalent files; smaller counties respond to requests.
California: the 58 county registrars each sell their own voter file and vote-by-mail data; Orange County's data page is typical, with a vote-by-mail file among its products for candidates. Most California campaigns get daily returns through their county or through a data vendor that aggregates every county.
Arizona: the county recorder is the source for early ballot returns, and national vendors resell them; Data Trust advertises live absentee and early-vote information as part of its file. The Active Early Voting List itself is governed by A.R.S. 16-544.

The daily loop: subtract returned voters from the universe

The loop is simple and it has to run every day. In the evening, pull the county's file. Match each row to your list on voter ID and mark those voters as returned for this election. Overnight, rebuild the chase list: your target universe minus everyone marked returned. In the morning, send that list to your texters, phone bankers, and walkers. Repeat until the deadline.

Your target universe is the set of identified and modeled supporters among likely voters that you built before ballots dropped; how many votes to win a local election covers how to size it. The chase list is that universe minus returns, and it shrinks every day. That shrinkage is your scoreboard: if your supporters are returning at a higher rate than the district as a whole, you are winning the window.

Accept the lag. A voter who drops a ballot at 4 p.m. is still on tomorrow morning's list, and some volunteers will hear I already voted. Tell them that is expected and to mark it, not to argue. Tighten the lag by pulling the file later at night, not by re-architecting.

Fail loudly. If the day's file has zero rows, or a count wildly different from yesterday's, stop and check before you rebuild the list. A silent empty file is indistinguishable from nobody voted today, and the result is a morning spent texting people who already voted to remind them to vote.

Evening: download the file. Record its date and row count.
Match on voter ID. Route rows that do not match to a review queue instead of dropping them.
Rebuild: chase list = universe minus returned. Compare today's count to yesterday's.
Morning: send only to non-returners, inside texting quiet hours.
Track your supporters' return rate against the county's overall rate.

Cure and signature-verification chase

Every vote-by-mail state checks the signature on the return envelope against the voter's registration, and every state in the table above lets a voter fix a missing or mismatched signature, on a deadline. Nevada's NRS 293.269927 requires the clerk to contact the voter when two employees see a reasonable question about the signature. California Elections Code 3019 requires notice by mail plus phone, text, or email where available, and gives the voter until 5 p.m. on the applicable deadline to return a signature verification statement. Washington's RCW 29A.60.165 requires notice by first-class mail and by phone, text, or email if on file.

The counties notify the voter, but voters ignore mail from the county. The cure chase is your campaign calling and knocking those voters, explaining what the county needs, and, where the rules allow, walking them through the form. In a council race decided by 40 votes, the challenged list can be the whole margin. NCSL's signature cure table (updated 2026-08-31) lists each state's deadline; the ones for the vote-by-mail states are in the table above.

Get the challenged list the same way you get the returned list. Washington's matchback data flags challenged ballots. Clark County posts signature curing data. Colorado's cure deadline is 11:59 p.m. eight days after the election, so the chase runs a full week past election night. Assign your best volunteers, the ones who are calm and precise, to cure calls; a confused voter who gives up is a lost vote.

Permanent early-voter lists and what they mean for targeting

Outside the universal-mail states, many states let any voter join a permanent list and receive a mail ballot for every election without asking again. NCSL's table (updated 2026-07-20) lists Arizona, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, Virginia, and the District of Columbia as states where any voter may sign up; several others limit the list to voters with disabilities or older voters.

For targeting, list membership is a vote-history field with predictive power: a voter on the list will have a ballot in hand on day one of the window, and their past method flags in the voter file will show mail. Chase them first, because their ballots come back first. In Arizona, remember the list is not truly permanent: under A.R.S. 16-544, a voter who does not vote an early ballot in two consecutive election cycles receives a notice and is removed if they do not respond within 90 days, so a chunk of last cycle's list will not receive a ballot this time. How to read a voter file explains the absentee and early flags.

Why the last week is about non-returners, not persuasion

By the last week, a large share of ballots are already in. Colorado's June 24, 2026 count, six days before its primary, was 578,570 returned ballots. Every one of those voters is beyond persuasion and beyond reminding. A persuasion mailer that lands on the final Thursday reaches a district where most of the people who will vote already have.

The research on persuasion points the same way even before ballots drop. Kalla and Broockman's meta-analysis of 49 field experiments found the average persuasive effect of campaign contact in general elections was zero. The reliable effect of contact is on turnout, and in a mail state turnout means returning a ballot that is sitting on the kitchen counter. So the final week has exactly two jobs: get identified supporters who have not returned to return, and cure the challenged ballots. Nothing else moves the number.

Practically, that means the final-week script is not about you. It is: Have you returned your ballot yet? Do you know where your drop box is? It needs to be received by 7 p.m. Tuesday, and here is what to do if the county says there is a problem with your signature. Door knocking for local campaigns covers how to run that conversation at the door.

Ballot receipt deadlines differ. Colorado ballots must be in the clerk's hands by 7 p.m. on election day; postmarks do not count. Other states accept postmarked ballots for days afterward. Put your state's rule in the script.

Building the operation

You need three things: one person who owns the nightly pull and rebuild, a target universe built before ballots drop, and channels that can be re-pointed every morning. A text program is the natural first channel because a daily send to a shrinking list is exactly what it is built for; the consent and registration rules are in political texting rules. Phone banks are second. Doors are the most expensive channel, so save walk turf for the dense precincts where your non-returners cluster.

Do not buy a vendor product you cannot audit. If a vendor's chase list is smaller than your own subtraction says it should be, ask them which match key they used. The right answer is the voter ID and nothing else. The state guides for each vote-by-mail state name the agency that publishes returned-ballot data and how to get it.

Frequently asked questions

What is a ballot chase?

A field program that runs during a vote-by-mail window: each day the campaign takes the county's list of voters whose ballots have been received, removes them from its list of targeted supporters, and contacts only the people who have not yet returned a ballot. The goal is to spend every hour of the final weeks on voters who can still be moved.

Does the returned-ballot file show how someone voted?

No. It records that the county received the voter's envelope, and sometimes whether the envelope was accepted or challenged for a signature problem. Ballot choices are secret in every state. The file tells you who is finished, not who they chose.

When do ballots go out in Oregon, Washington, and Colorado?

Oregon clerks mail between the 20th and 14th day before the election (ORS 254.470). Washington auditors mail at least 18 days before (RCW 29A.40.070). Colorado's 2026 calendar has clerks mailing general-election packets between 29 and 25 days before November 3, 2026, so October 2 to October 9.

What is a cure, and how long does a voter have?

A cure fixes a missing or mismatched signature on a returned ballot envelope so the ballot counts. Deadlines vary: 21 days after the election in Oregon, eight days after in Colorado, 5 p.m. on the sixth day after in Nevada, the fifth business day after a federal election in Arizona, and 22 days after a statewide election in California. NCSL maintains a table of every state's deadline.

Is Arizona a vote-by-mail state?

Not in the universal sense; Arizona does not mail a ballot to every voter. But any voter can join the Active Early Voting List under A.R.S. 16-544 and receive an early ballot automatically, mailed starting 27 days before the election, so most Arizona campaigns run a ballot chase on the same daily loop. Voters who skip two consecutive cycles of early voting are removed from the list after a notice.

Run the loop without a spreadsheet

Culper keeps your walk lists, texting, and call sheets attached to the same records, so a chase universe can be rebuilt each morning and every channel points at the people who have not returned a ballot.

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